By Jeff Kollath
On the five-plus hour ride home on Sunday afternoon (made even longer after I locked the keys in the car in West Union, Iowa), I had a lot of time to reflect on the 2010 Winter Dance Party in Clear Lake, IA. Held in the Surf Ballroom some 51 years after “The Day the Music Died,” the Winter Dance Party remains as one of the most fitting tributes to three of rock n roll’s early pioneers – Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper – that perished after their plane went down in a snowstorm in the early morning of February 3, 1959. What I witnessed in Clear Lake was one of the most honest and genuine concerts I’ve ever attended. Standing in the ballroom when the doors opened at 630, I saw 70 year olds rush to the front of the stage – with almost as much speed as their grandchildren would have rushing to the rail at Pitchfork or Lollapalooza – to catch a closer look at their idols. I saw women in poodle skirts and hair ribbons, followed closely by their husbands wearing their letter jackets and sporting flat tops and duck-tails. The show lasted until 12:45am, and hardly a soul had left early. For most in the crowd, this was their only show of the year, their only chance to step back in time, and imagine their idols and themselves as they were fifty years ago.
The Surf hasn’t changed much in 50 years. The stage is a bit larger, but the original booth still surround the dance floor, the surf murals still grace the walls, and the pineapple wallpaper still greets each and every visitor upon their entrance. The show kicked off with former teen idol Fabian, who strode to the microphone with shrieks of glee. Pulled off his South Philly front perch by the Dick Clark machine in the late 1950s, Fabian has always been more of a face than a singer, and Saturday’s performance certainly reinforced that. Women shrieked and flashbulbs popped as he launched into Stevie Ray Vaughan’s “The House Is A-Rockin,” which was only surpassed by a troubling verson of Chuck Berry’s ”Back in the USA.” While I watched “patriotic” images of flags, eagles, American landmarks, and, of course, that paean of culinary excellence, Dick Clark’s American Bandstand Restaurant, flash on the screen, I could only wonder what Wayne Kramer and the rest of MC5 would have thought of it. After a short set by the Orlons (“Wah-Watusi”), teen princess Lesley Gore hit the stage and delivered a solid set of her hits, including the omnipresent “It’s My Party,” and the follow-up, “Judy’s Turn to Cry,” I have had Gore’s first album in my collection since I plucked it out of my grandmother’s console stereo in the late 1990s, and have always been intrigued by a performer who once recorded SEVEN songs with the word “cry” on one record! She, like everyone else, talked about the good ole days, played lip-service to Dick Clark, but her performance was nothing short of brilliant, brimming with confidence and energy. The set closer, the proto-feminist anthem “You Don’t Own Me,” still packs a wicked punch with its strong message of independence. After a short setbreak, the Crickets, Buddy Holly’s former backing band, rolled through a set of Holly’s hits, plus some a few songs from frontman Sonny Curtis’ vast catalog, including the theme from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”
The final performer of the night, Righteous Brother Bill Medley, raced through the songs that he and Beaver Dam, Wisconsin native Bobby Hatfield made famous. Hitting the stage to a montage that featured his video of “He Ain’t Heavy (He’s My Brother)” from Rambo III, and of course, the final scene of Dirty Dancing, Medley hit all the notes throughout his hour-long set. Having just taken up residence in Branson, Missouri, Medley’s set occasionally ventured into schlock (especially when his daughter joined him onstage), but, as it should be with a great performer, his voice carried him through. With the final notes of “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling” reverberating in the hall, the sound crew set up more amps and mics for the final jam. Curtis and the Crickets held court with a solid version of “Not Fade Away” and backed Medley on the obligatory “Johnny B. Goode,” which seemed a fitting closer to a night dedicated to the early years of rock n roll.
As the house lights came up, and “Rave On” played over the PA, everyone filed out into the bitter Iowa cold, tired, but certainly with an extra hop in their step. Music has always had the amazing power to transform and transport, to take the listener to a different place and time, and to remember and reminisce, and on Saturday night, I saw that happen to nearly 2,000 people. There was something so comforting about the Winter Dance Party. Perhaps it was the simplicity and purity of music that has been around for nearly a half-century, or maybe it was the adulation without reservation or criticism. In the end, though, it was a lesson I learned from these Iowans that were older than my parents that it’s perfectly ok to enjoy a show for what it was, and not worry about what was missing.
, which had sold millions and gone platinum over there. Here across the pond, though, they were only playing to one or two hundred people, tops, at an out-of-the-way dive bar. The show had a ton of energy, though, and turned me on to The Back Room. But since then (a span of about 20 years in Internet Music Time) I had heard very little about them, so I was excited to hear they were coming to 
feature prominently on my Drink Whiskey And Cry playlist. But those lyrics are beyond sad, man, to the point where I even feel a little guilty deriving cheap pleasure from it. In Hospice, gorgeous atmospherics package heart-crushing lyrics about a terminally ill child. When a couple of guys up front started jumping around, I wanted to shout “How can you fuckers dance? Can’t you hear the kid is dying?” but that would have been unreasonable. Instead I stood still and let myself get goosebumps while singer Peter Silberman’s voice cracked and wavered on soaring highs as if breaking under the weight of the lyrics. Their set was short but they managed to play through more than half of their songs before a slightly awkward exit where it seemed neither the band nor the audience were aware that they were finished.
